Our last stop in Ireland was Gort. Not a lovely sounding word in English, but it's Irish for "the field." It's a market town, with a square, and a fair amount of hustle and bustle, and it's on the main route from Galway to Shannon. That was convenient, because we traveled by bus this trip--and I must say we enjoyed every minute of not having to ( Read more... )

--I do like to play around with old songs.

Ballyvaughn is a mid-sized Irish town where the Burren meets the sea.


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Our travels through the Burren were also with the Galway Tour Company, which dropped us at Sleepzone, the Burren, where we stayed two nights. This particular hostel is conveniently located on the outskirts of Lisdoonvarna, home of a salmon smokehouse, and the usual mix of pubs. HH and I went to the Roadside Tavern, which has the distinction of ( Read more... )

The Burren is a region of limestone karst south of Galway. Unlike Connemara, which is green with ferns where it isn't green with grass, the Burren is gray from bare rock--where it isn't green with grass.


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After we were picked up from Sleepzone Connemara, it was on to Kylemore Abbey, which started life as Kylemore Castle in the 1860s.


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Sleepzone Connemara is in the middle of some great walking country, and in late May, early June, it doesn't get dark until well after 10 pm. So our first afternoon there, we took a walk headed for the Atlantic. We didn't go all the way there, because that would have been an all-day venture, but we did see some lovely, wild country.


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Sleepzone Galway was our base for the first ten days of our time Ireland. Sleepzone has three hostels in the West of Ireland, and they have an arrangement with Galway Tour Company so that you can take one of the company's tours, stop for a night (or two) at one of the other Sleepzone hostels, and then pick up the tour again. So that's what we did.

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Galway isn't an ancient city, but grew around a 12th century fort. Claddagh, however, was an Irish fishing village that was there before the fort.


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HH and I arrived in Galway on a sunny, warm summer Saturday. Mind you, it wasn't hot and humid the way it can get at home, but it was warm enough for short sleeves, which was about the last thing we expected in Ireland. As we discovered, the Galwegians didn't expect it, either, and were busy enjoying it and exclaiming over it with everyone else who ( Read more... )

(Yes, I do know the song is "Glockamorra," but I couldn't resist ( Read more... )